


High Tide

by solongsun



Series: Maps [5]
Category: the GazettE
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-24
Updated: 2019-01-24
Packaged: 2019-10-15 06:52:21
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,554
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17523932
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/solongsun/pseuds/solongsun
Summary: Aoi.(again)





	High Tide

Because he's standing in front of him Aoi has to smile, cheeks aching and showing teeth, eyes crinkled convincingly. His own hair tickles against his shoulders and he thinks absently to himself that he needs to have it cut, has been needing it cut for ages; why hasn't he cut it yet?

Oh: because of the time that Reita twined his hands up in it when they were kissing; said it was sort of pretty on him.

Oh yeah.

He watches as Reita struggles with the silence between them, turns blindly towards the sea, hand playing agitatedly with the end of his scarf; the day is cold but clear and sharp, a real winter morning, viciously bright. The air smells of salt and beneath it, something steelier; the smell of cold water, chill damp sand, flint. Aoi sniffs. The breeze makes his eyes want to water.

'Hokkaido, huh,' he says without inflection. Dully, the words fall to the sand in front of him.

'I asked my parents,' Reita says lowly, painfully. 'I asked if I could stay. Go to boarding school, or even...'

He looks a little pink; maybe from the raw wind. 'Even stay with your family,' he finishes in a mutter, and Aoi squints quickly out towards the horizon, to where the sun reflects blindingly off the waves; with his face like that he could be either smiling or grimacing, it's hard to tell.

'Be sort of a social suicide,' he says lightly, 'Living with me.'

Reita has a look like he's been injured.

'Aoi.'

'My parents'd be thrilled though,' he blazes on, a sort of steeliness to his voice and a stiffness to his face, 'You'd be like the son they never had.'

'Aoi, please,' Reita says quietly, and Aoi presses his lips together. There's a weird sort of feeling in his chest, something tight that he can't exactly explain; swollen, tender, like some deep bruise that's blossoming out inside of him.

Cruelly, the light catching on Reita's hair makes him think of the first day they met, when Reita was standing in his shorts and cleats out on the grass in the April sunshine and Aoi was

 

_hidden away in the darkness of the old kit shed with his right hand tucked down inside the shorts of Masaru Tanaka – captain of the soccer team, jersey number 12, centre-back – and getting impatient; the captain is working his way up to cumming but seems to be trying to hold back, to draw it out, breathing heavy with his eyes half-lidded and unfocussed, and Aoi's wrist is starting to ache. When he finally cums it's with a guttural noise. His hips buck up into Aoi's hand, which Aoi delicately removes from his shorts and wipes off carelessly on the concrete wall._

_'Nice one,' Masaru pants, checking around his shorts concernedly for any spills, 'Thanks, fag.'_

_'Yeah,' Aoi says drily, 'Don't mention it.'_

_He's not supposed to smoke on school grounds, but he's not supposed to dole out handjobs there either, so he lights up a cigarette. Masaru stands with his back to him, a solid obstacle between him and the door; his broad shoulders are sort of squared and his head is lowered, though it's hard to tell in the gloom._

_'You know I'll kill you if you tell anybody,' the captain says, and Aoi snorts._

_'Yeah, right. I just want to get kicked out that badly.'_

_'I'm serious,' he says, his tone sharp, 'Everybody already knows that you'll jerk off anyone who asks.'_

_'So what's the problem?' Aoi asks lazily, and finds himself suddenly pinned to the wall by one shoulder, uncomfortably close to where he just smeared the captain's cum. He squirms._

_'The problem,' Masaru says deliberately, 'Is that if I hear my name in connection with any of your pansy shit, you'll fucking regret it. What's_ left _of you will fucking regret it. Got me?'_

_'Got you,' Aoi mumbles and Masaru releases him; he rubs at his chest and neck reproachfully._

_'You'd better suck it tomorrow,' the captain says, a hint of threat in his voice that makes him sound stupidly schoolboyish, and Aoi rolls his eyes as he shoulders his book bag._

_'Yeah, whatever,' he mutters._ Whatever, dickhead. _He gestures towards the door impatiently, 'Mind if I get out of here now? I have better places to be, you know.'_

_A lie, but what the hell. He puffs on his cigarette and notes that his hand smells like cum; a smell that even in this dank, dark little room, even when it's come from an idiot like Masaru Tanaka, makes his cock sort of stir between his legs. He shifts. 'You going to let me leave, or what?'_

_The captain makes a dismissive sort of noise and pushes the door open, stepping out into the sunlight at the edge of the football pitch: it's four o'clock on a Thursday in early April and the light is that after-school sort of light that Aoi likes, soft and sweet and sleepy, and as he follows Masaru out into it he feels it wash over him like something liquid, pooling in his collarbones._

_There's a boy in front of the kit shed, and he eyes him curiously: in this stupid small town, he's unfamiliar. He's standing in the school soccer kit on the white lines that mark the pitch, a ball tucked under one arm; his dark hair is chin-length, unusual for here, and the sun lights his skin up in gold._

_Stupidly Aoi says, 'hi,' and the boy's clear dark eyes come to rest on him._

_'Hi.'_

_Masaru sort of half-cuffs, half-pushes his upper arm, 'Will you fuck off, Aoi?' He nods at the boy, 'You Suzuki?'_

_'Yeah. The coach said I should meet you here to talk about trying out.'_

_'What grade are you in?'_

_'Tenth.'_

_The same grade as him, Aoi can't help but think._

_'Team's sort of full,' Masaru says, and Suzuki regards him briefly._

_'Yeah, but I'm good.'_

_'Bye, then,' Aoi mutters under his breath, thinking he needs to wash his hands and stop by a corner store and get some more breath mints before he goes home, mask the smells of cigarette smoke and whatever else from his parents' suspicious noses; Masaru gives him an abbreviated nod, a sort of check mark: goodbye, got it. Aoi scowls, yanking his bag up higher on his back and deliberately scuffing his feet against the white-painted lines of the soccer pitch as he crosses the field. The air smells good, summery, like warm grass. He runs his fingers over the chain-link fence as he walks, guts his cigarette and grabs the fence by its top, swinging his body over it easily._

_For some reason he looks back then. He sees Masaru and this new try-out, this Suzuki, already engaged: the two of them just getting into it, churning up the field beneath their cleats, tackling and retackling, neither holding the ball for more than a few seconds at a time. From Aoi's distance it looks weirdly intricate, leg-locking, like dancing. The sun is low behind the school building, its golden rays getting in Aoi's eyes. It is probably this trick of the light that makes Suzuki appear to be glowing._

_Aoi turns his back, shoulders his bag and sets off_

 

down the beach, his numb legs working on autopilot, Reita keeping an easy pace next to him. On such a cold day in their small town the beach is deserted, but force of habit leads the two of them around behind the rigid little outcropping of rock, the one the locals call Old Man's Hand, its fingers grasping emptily up at the sky. Tucked away at the mouth of a seaweed-smelling cave, Aoi sits down on a rock worn smooth by the sea; Reita takes his seat next to him, hands pressed nervously between his knees.

'When?' Aoi thinks to ask, and Reita shrugs.

'About a month, I guess. It's normally that, once dad gets his notice.'

'You're going to be fucking cold up in Hokkaido.'

Reita gives a wincing sort of smile. 'Yeah.'

He looks up at Aoi, the sunlight filtering out his eyes into shades of black and brown and gold, 'You'll write to me, won't you? When I'm there?'

'I never know what to write about.'

'Aoi—'

'Want to fool around?' Aoi interrupts, and Reita gives a sort of blink.

'Aoi...'

'What? We're in our spot.' Aoi shrugs, the movement oddly awkward for him. 'Don't you want to?'

The conflict on Reita's face is a pitiful thing, and Aoi smiles wryly as he puts a cigarette between his lips. Even in their sheltered spot the breeze is too brisk for him to light up, and steadily Reita holds his hands out, making a little windbreak. Aoi takes a blue-grey drag.

'Thanks,' he mutters.

Carefully, like Aoi might snap at him, Reita takes his free hand between his own. He holds it strangely, like it's incredibly valuable; like he's drinking in the sight of it before he covers it up gently. His hands are warmer than Aoi's cold ones; he has a habit of sticking them in his pockets when he walks.

'I know you're angry,' he says quietly. 'This isn't my choice, you know.'

'I'm not angry,' Aoi says stiffly. 'I don't care.'

He doesn't want his cigarette; he feels sort of sick. He pitches it away and folds his arms against the cold, willing his head to stop spinning; next to him Reita leans forward, his head angled downward as if there's some answer written in the sand at his feet.

'I'll never forget you, Aoi,' he mumbles. 'If that's what you're worried about.'

'I'm not worried,' Aoi snaps, but his expression is oddly lost-looking, and he rakes an agitated hand through his hair. An awkward sort of silence grows between them, and Aoi wraps his arms around his own body tightly. It's weird but he's actually sort of shaking, perched where he is on the rock; his head is horribly light and dizzy and there's a feeling in his stomach like he's going to hurl right there at the mouth of the cave. Making like he's just huddling up against the wind he shifts slightly closer to Reita's side, bending down low over his own knees to ease the awful desire to vomit that's rising up inside of him like a balloon; he catches his friend's familiar smell of soap, grass, skin and takes a deep breath that almost sounds like a gasp. His eyes sting. He forces himself to concentrate on the sand, the patterns of the sand as it blows around their feet, the sound of the waves and the cry of the seabirds, the keening of the gulls that you can hear at the school, at his house, all over town and

 

_overhead, a high mournful sound, like they're grieving even as they wheel around in the sky, dancing around each other and riding the air currents. He looks up at them so he won't have to look at this Suzuki kid, jersey number 20, sweeper on the soccer team, approaching Aoi now where he stands in front of his locker, scrubbing the word FAG off it with the sleeve of his dark blue gakuran._

_Reita's been at this school for less than two weeks and already he blends in seamlessly with the other soccer players, sitting at their table at lunch and going to their parties; whatever, Aoi couldn't give a shit._

_'It's Aoi, right?'_

_Aoi crosses his arms defensively over his chest. 'Yeah?' he responds rudely, and Reita blinks. His eyes are dark, the sort of dark that looks soft, Aoi notices. The expression in them is unclear._

_'Um...I know I don't know you, so this is kind of awkward, but I wanted to ask you a favour.'_

_Oh, great: his reputation precedes him. Aoi forces a stiff smile onto his face, rubbing harder at his locker._

_'Yeah, okay.'_

_Reita's face breaks out into a relieved smile, which somehow makes him harder to look at. Blindly, Aoi glances down at the floor._

_'Great! Thank you. It's just – you're in my maths class.'_

_Aoi frowns. 'Yeah, so?'_

_'So...' Reita looks slightly perturbed, 'I was just wondering if I could borrow your notes for last Friday. I kind of zoned out.'_

_Oh._

_Aoi opens his mouth but finds he has nothing to say._

_That's_ it _?_

_'I don't take notes,' he says cautiously, and Reita makes an awkward sort of grimace._

_'Oh, right. Uh...never mind. I guess I can ask someone else.'_

_'Right.'_

_Reita gives him a brief sort of smile. 'Thanks anyway. Do you do any clubs or anything?'_

_Aoi manages to suppress his snort. 'No.'_

_'So you're going home now?'_

_Aoi gives up on his locker finally; turns around and leans against it so Reita won't be able to see what it says._

_'What,' he says flatly, and Reita shrugs._

_'I just think you live near me, that's all. The uphill street with the big gingko tree at the bottom. You're the big white house, right?'_

_The padlock on Aoi's locker is pressing painfully into his spine, but he doesn't move._

_'Yeah.'_

_'Yeah, my family just moved into the little one on the end.'_

_'Congratulations.'_

_'So, you want to walk home with me?'_

_Aoi's eyes settle on him suspiciously. 'Why?' he asks, and Reita gives a soft snort of a laugh._

_'I don't know; because I'm new and I don't know many people yet and you seem...normal?'_

_He says this, though there's a look on his face like he might have started to doubt it._

_'What about your teammates?' Aoi asks bluntly, and Reita gives an appealing little half-shrug._

_'They're okay. You're friends with a few of them, right?'_

_'Something like that,' Aoi mutters._

_'So...you want to walk home?' Reita asks again, peering at him like he's really a bit concerned now, and Aoi sighs._

_'Sure you want to be seen with me?' he asks in a blank sort of voice, and Reita blinks._

_'Uh, yeah, I think I can handle it.'_

_Oh, right, because this new kid thinks he's buddy-buddy with the soccer team, like he's part of the running order: team, cheerleaders, refreshment committee, and the kid who hangs around and jerks them off after practice. The classic game day line-up._

_'Sure,' Aoi says heavily, 'Okay. Let's go.'_

_But he waits for Reita to turn around before he steps away from the word scrawled on the front of his locker. Just in case._

_And he realises that he's just conned himself into the beginnings of a friendship and that he's got about one week, max, before he's discovered and this all comes crashing down around him. Still, for some reason he can't explain, he finds himself following as_

 

the tide starts to come in, lapping closer and closer towards their feet, and Reita sighs and gets to his feet.

'We should go,' he says, but expressionlessly, like he doesn't really mean it. Blankly, Aoi nods.

'Yeah.'

But they stay as still as statues, Reita standing and Aoi huddled into himself on the rock, both of them watching the slow advance of the water. Like it's the only sensible thing to do, Aoi reaches down and strips off his shoes and socks, balancing them on the rock next to him. The waves make soft rushing sounds, soothing. The gulls cry overhead, performing their acrobatics at daredevil angles; a cold little wavelet inches towards his bare foot and then withdraws, as if flinching.

'I don't want you to go,' Aoi says at last, heavily, like the words are costing him a lot. He watches Reita's shoulders slump.

'I don't want to go, either.'

'Do you have to?'

Limply, he shrugs. 'I can't see any way out of it.'

Aoi nods once, shortly.

It crosses his mind that he could steal him, if only he had a place to hide him.

'Don't know what I'm gonna do without you,' he mumbles. He forces a smile onto his face, like he's joking.

'Me neither.'

The water rushes and froths around Aoi's bare toes.

'You know,' Reita says suddenly, awkwardly, 'You – this hasn't been... _nothing_ to me.'

Aoi's quiet for a long time.

'Me neither.'

The air around them is dim and grey and Aoi wonders how long it'll take Reita to forget

 

_your key?'_

_The call comes from across the road where the air is thick with rain, a haze of it hanging in the air and in a misty corona above the slick street, and Aoi looks like something drowned as he shivers angrily in front of his own doorway._

_'What gave me away?' it's hard to sound as sarcastic as he wants to when he's having to almost shout to be heard above the downpour, and from under his umbrella, Reita shoots him a grin that's only a little smug._

_'You want to come over?'_

_'Huh?'_

_'To my_ house _, Aoi. You're soaked.'_

_'Am I,' Aoi says caustically, but Reita just shrugs._

_'Well, if you'd rather wait out here...'_

_He begins to walk away, his feet splashing but his walk infuriatingly perky, and Aoi grits his teeth hard before running out after him, sputtering in the rain._

_'Fine_. _Wait. Just –_ wait _, will you?'_

_Reita laughs at him but stands still for a moment, letting Aoi catch up to him, and once they're side-by-side he holds his umbrella a little higher so it covers them both, and they fall into step. Reita lives just four houses away and they cover the distance in silence, the rain tapping briskly on the umbrella's canopy. It's a normal, modest sort of family home with a wooden veranda on the ocean-facing side, and when Reita lets them in Aoi sees that the inside is decorated in a comfortable, relaxed sort of way: the kind of décor his mother would roll her eyes at._

_'Nice place,' he says, shivering and dripping over the floor, and Reita shrugs as he bends to take his shoes off._

_'It's a rental. Dad has to move around every few years for his job, and his company pays for the place, so it's not really anything to do with us.'_

_'Oh. So where are you actually from?'_

_'Before this? Hyogo.'_

_'No, I mean originally.'_

_'Oh, right. Kanagawa.'_

_Aoi bobs his head awkwardly, trying to loosen the strands of hair that have plastered themselves wetly to his face and neck. 'Cool.'_

_'Nah, not really. We were living in a factory town. It's nicer here.'_

_They pause, and Aoi gives an uncomfortable sort of shrug. 'Right.'_

_'Yeah. Uh...you could probably use some dry clothes. C'mon, let's go to my room.'_

_Disarmed, Aoi can't figure out anything more to do than simply trail Reita up the stairs, his socks making wet squishing noises with each step. His bedroom, when they reach it, is small and cluttered but with a good window that faces south; he must get a lot of light in here. He busies himself grabbing track pants and a T-shirt out of a battered chest of drawers – maybe it's beaten up from being moved around so much – and tosses them lightly at Aoi, who luckily has the wherewithal to catch them._

_'You don't have to give me your clothes,' he says uneasily, and Reita snorts._

_'You're not planning to keep them, are you?'_

_'Why are you so nice to me?' Aoi demands angrily._

_It goes quiet, apart from the sound of the rain beating against the window. Frowning, Reita lowers himself down onto his bed, shrugging off his gakuran to reveal a plain white T-shirt underneath._

_'I don't understand,' he says slowly. 'I'm not being especially nice, or anything.'_

_'Look,' Aoi says impatiently, 'If you think you have to like..._ court _me, or something, then you don't. I'm sure you've heard all about me by now, so if you want me to jerk you off like the rest of your fucking team, or blow you or whatever, just be a man and fucking ask for it, all right?'_

_Reita's giving him a look that he can't decode. Aoi grabs his hair up in a wet handful and tugs on it painfully, sending little streams of cold water down the back of his neck._

_'I don't want you to jerk me off,' Reita says at last, slowly, like he's reading lines from a play that he doesn't quite understand._

_'What, then?' Aoi snaps, and Reita looks almost intimidated as he shrugs._

_'I don't know. You looked lonely. I kept seeing you around school just by yourself, so I figured we could hang out if you wanted to.'_

_'Yeah, well my reputation is kind of at an all-time low at the moment, so maybe you should just drop it.'_

_'Nah, I'm okay,' Reita says easily, and Aoi gives him a sharp glance._

_'You do know what I'm talking about, right?' he asks baldly, and Reita goes a little red around the ears._

_'I...heard some stuff.'_

_'So.'_

_'Well, so what?'_

_'Oh right, so you just...don't care?'_

_'Yeah, that's about it,' Reita says, his tone mild despite the blush creeping up his neck. 'I like hanging out with you. I'm not really used to making things more complicated than that.'_

_Despite himself, Aoi stares, and Reita shrugs. 'There's a bathroom across the hall. You should change. You're kind of flooding my floor.'_

_Yeah, he is. But time seems to have come over all slow._

_So Reita just, what, wants him to hang out?_

_As a friend?_

_The rain is pouring in little rivers down the windowpane and through it_

 

the stars are hard and bright, distant and cold, caught up in the sky like they've been frozen there. Reita's bedroom is chilly but it's warm inside his bed, the two of them pressed tightly together on the twin mattress, Aoi's sleeping bag forgotten on the floor; Reita makes some soft noise and Aoi kisses him urgently, over and over, trying to commit him to memory.

No, not that: trying to turn him on. Trying to get him so completely, helplessly wound up that he'll change his mind, say he can't possibly leave.

Aoi bites at his friend's lower lip, sucks on it, grips his waist in both his hands to pull him closer and grind against him. Beneath the blankets Reita has one hand inside Aoi's shirt and the other pushed just below the waist of his underwear, not touching his dick or his ass but instead curved around his hip; he groans, though, when Aoi pushes up against him; groans and lets his head fall forward, his lips butting against Aoi's insistently.

'I can suck you,' Aoi promises in a hot whisper against his friend's skin, 'Let me suck you.'

'Aoi – fuck—'

'Don't wake up your parents,' he breathes and kisses his warm cheek, nuzzling his nose just briefly against the first downy hair growth there. 'Okay?'

'Okay,' Reita says helplessly, 'Okay, I won't – Aoi—'

He's diving under the covers before Reita can say anything else, tugging at the other boy's underwear; it comes down unevenly but low enough for his dick to spring free and Aoi is on it instantly, inhaling the scent of him; the smell of him is stronger down here, powerful, a man smell; he lets it go to his head. How different Reita feels from him; how similar. The other boy's dick is flushed and rigid, standing straight up away from his body, and Aoi can feel the shake in Reita's thigh as he licks at it desperately. He tastes good; he tastes the way he always does and Aoi whimpers softly as he takes him between his lips, sucking on him in the way he likes: soft at first, flicks of the tongue, teasing, affectionate. He's already slippery with precum at the tip, and something in the restrained buck of his hips tells Aoi that he's not going to last long. Under the covers, his hands twine in Aoi's hair.

Beautiful. That's what he calls Aoi's hair when they're alone together: beautiful. He twists his fingers into it, not pulling him closer but simply holding him in place, steadying him as he moves his head over Reita's straining dick. He's aware, dimly, that the other boy is trying to tell him something, whispering it to him with a mounting urgency, but his hands are covering Aoi's ears and the blood is rushing inside his head and all he wants is to make him cum; to taste it, to feel it. Reita's cock hits the back of his throat and tears spring to his eyes as he sucks. His hand grips at his friend's hip, like he might wriggle away if he doesn't.

Strange how something can be so completely different but still feel so much like the first time, camped out on the beach under the stars, Reita

 

_smiling at him in the darkness, his sleeping bag unzipped to the waist and his chest bare, his arms folded dreamily behind his head. Earlier that evening they got into a little tussle, Reita playing like he was going to throw Aoi's sleeping bag into the sea, and Aoi's dick still feels a little heavy and sensitive from the hard-on he got when they were rolling around on the sand._

_He knows he's going to kiss him. The knowledge is screaming inside his head like an alarm bell, and Reita just keeps on fucking smiling at him._

_There's a chance that if he does this, he'll be lost forever. He knows that. There's a chance that Reita will hate him; an even scarier chance that he won't._

_Fucked. Completely fucked, either way._

_'Rei,' Aoi says abruptly, and his friend's smile widens._

_'Yeah?'_

_His face is far too close. His eyes are bright in the darkness. The waves crash behind them and Aoi lands a clumsy, hasty kiss on his friend's stupid, beautiful lips, barely registering the feel of him before he lurches back into his own sleeping bag, heart racing._

_He can't bring himself to speak, not even to say he's sorry._

_Time seems to have done that slowing down thing again._

_'Rei,' he says, almost chokes, losing it in a gasp as his friend's shaking hand cups itself around his jaw; as the other boy draws the two of them back together._

_There's sand clinging to his skin in a fine dust. Their lips touch and stick and they are so fucked and Reita tastes_

 

salty over his tongue, the best taste in the world; he sucks at it, laps it up, tries to fill himself with it.

Reita's hands are stroking at his hair and he presses his forehead against the soft skin of his friend's belly, comforting himself with the darkness there. The tears that have escaped smudge themselves against Reita's skin and Aoi clenches his jaw, tries to forbid the rest from coming out.

Dimly, above him, Reita is murmuring something soft about loving him, about adoring him, about needing him; he says it on a loop, as if dazed by it, his hands tracing patterns around Aoi's head like he's trying to soothe the truth into his mind.

But he won't stay.

'I should go home,' Aoi whispers against his skin. 'My parents will be angry.'

And he's so fucked.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I sincerely hope that this makes sense in the context of _Maps_ , but it's very late and at this point I really don't have a clue any more.


End file.
